[Bit]coin flipping: Bitcoin has died 99 times —and keeps coming back

Bitcoin is not the Terminator but it might as well be if we look at the overwhelmingly large number of obituaries this cryptocurrency has attracted. Although Mike Hearn, a prominent bitcoin developer, recently claimed that this digital currency is a failed experiment , it continues to resurrect after every punch.

After Mike Hearn publicly stated that bitcoin is a failed experiment many early adopters rushed to create obituaries for this cryptocurrency —all 99 eulogies can be found on a website called Bitcoin Obituaries. In short, the aim of this website is to list all the articles that have announced (in different words) the death of this digital currency. Mike Hearn’s Medium article occupies the 89th position, which means that bitcoin has died at least ten more times since mid-January.

A few titles about the demise of bitcoin

Bitcoin’s defamation began long before Mike Hearn voiced his opinion with titles such as Why bitcoin is doomed and Bitcoin will not survive and others which ensured readers that this cryptocurrency went into freefall. A plethora of publications announced the demise of bitcoin and it suddenly became a dead man walking. One of the most common titles related to bitcoin is that it has been surpassed by blockchain, which means that this cryptocurrency now has an expiration date.

Bitcoin has started to lose ground to a certain extent, but it is still the most popular cryptocurrency on the Dark Web, as a study carried out by two professors at King College London’s Department of War Studies shows. The report titled Cryptopolitik and the Darknet was published in the February-March issue of Survival: Global Politics and Strategy. According to Daniel Moore, one of the Department of War Studies’ cyber-threat intelligence engineers, “bitcoin is the most common currency employed in all Tor (software for enabling anonymous communication) hidden-services trade.” Although this is not something to be proud of, it shows that bitcoin is still alive.

Bitcoin payroll, anyone?

The idea of receiving bitcoins instead of real money does not have too many admirers, but German tech magazine t3n is now allowing employees to receive a piece of their salary in this (in)famous digital currency. The publication wrote in a blog post that their trial started in November last year, with employees receiving 20 EUR worth of bitcoin per paycheck and admitted that their editorial interest in new technologies and the way users adapt to them in everyday life was one of their motivations.

t3n is offering bitcoin as a tax-free benefit since this cryptocurrency is not considered legal tender in Germany. This bitcoin payroll service is only available in the German market for the time being.

Is bitcoin really dead?

It makes sense to take bitcoin’s pulse and see if its obituaries have (prematurely) rushed into declaring its death or they were right all along. Although this cryptocurrency has been split in two (we now have Bitcoin Classic and Bitcoin Core), the bitcoin community continues to exist and, as history has taught us, one concept dies only when people stop believing in it. Decentralization had to happen at one point, but what matters now is how it is shaping the future of bitcoin.